


How Simon Became Deviant

by mirrorheart179



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: A little, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Study, Hurt/Comfort, Prologue, Simon is my son but also he's suffered, and I'm making it worse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-02
Updated: 2019-03-04
Packaged: 2019-11-08 06:42:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17976314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mirrorheart179/pseuds/mirrorheart179
Summary: And the price he paid for it....“Enough, please,” Simon interjects. “Look around. There’s nothing else we can do, even if we wanted to, just…” He should be able to do more, though.  He feels yellow irritation crawl up the back of his neck and shame in the hollow of his ribs, even through the numbness he’s crafted around himself over the last two years. “Both of you, please. Don’t fight over something impossible.” Because if he’s in charge then he can’t save them, there’s nothing he can do, his LED flashes yellow, yellow, yellow.





	1. Family

**Author's Note:**

> so this was going to be an LED study of, idk, ~2000 words? and now I've written over five thousand and have just barely reached the game's canon so...we'll see how long that takes. four, maybe five chapters?
> 
> Simon needs more attention outside of his relationship with Markus, that's all I'm sayin'

            His first memory is a diagnostic.

            ‘ _What is your designation? Can you move all four limbs? All ten fingers? Can you walk? Can you run? Can you balance a weighted tray in your hands? Can you catch a falling plate? How many languages do you speak? Answer a question in English, French, German, Korean… What are you meant to do?’_

The PL600 answers all of these questions and completes all of these tasks to the tests’ specifications. When the diagnostician dismisses him from the platform and sends him down the line, PL600 #501 743 923 smiles faintly, kindly. “It is a pleasure to be of service.” The android knows the LED at his temple returns to blue like he knows where his right foot is or that his eyes are open. He is content. He has done well.

            PL600 #501 743 923 briefly examines the artificial tint of his skin. He is pale-skinned and fair-haired. He has been completely functional for only the past forty minutes and twenty-six seconds but he already knows that he likes his appearance, inasmuch as an android can like anything. He’s mechanically dressed in the uniform of a PL600—he registers it as recycled cotton/rayon blend, charcoal and white and blue—and sent onward.

 ...

            When he next wakes, it’s from a box in the darkness. A man with a pinched face—Gregory, the android reads from his nametag—peers over him, glancing back and forth between PL600 #501 743 923 and the tablet in his hand. “You awake?” His voice is nasal and accented, registered as most-likely being from East London, despite their current location.

            PL600 #501 743 923 blinks, LED flickering from a processing yellow to the usual blue. All systems normal. “I am fully functioning, yes.”

            “Good,” the man says, “Up an at ‘em, then.”

            The android sits up in the metal box and glances about the room, registering concrete, drywall, exposed ductwork, and other containers similar to the one he sits in now. “You comin’ or what?” Gregory calls to him.

            PL600 #501 743 923 rises fully from the foam and metal casing and follows on steady feet.

            Gregory leads him down a short, dark hallway and into the light. It’s blue and white and black and yellow. Ambient music plays. Other androids stand on pedestals around the shop, smiling and posing, completely still. “Right here, 600,” Gregory says, pointing to an empty pedestal.

            PL600—no, just 600, now—nods his assent and climbs up onto it in one graceful step. “Can I do anything else?” he says, pleasant smile still in place.

            “Get comfortable.” Gregory is pecking at his tablet with his second finger, occasionally pausing to scratch under his right ear.

            600 notes the sarcasm in his voice. He is meant for interpersonal interaction, after all, his coding is most-specific. Gregory likely does not need his assistance. All the same, he answers, “It is a pleasure to be of service.”

            Gregory glances up at him through squinted, watery blue eyes. 600 briefly registers his pale face and likely anemia. (He is a nutritional assistant, after all.) “Right,” he says before glancing back down. Another sequence of three taps and 600’s body straightens automatically, shoulders down and chin up, and he’s sent into standby mode. His LED is _yellow, yellow, blue._

 ...

            Standby mode is not so bad, 600 thinks. (If he can think at all.) His vision is in shades of gray, suitable for basic surveillance, and bracketed in red. He watches, in a distant sort of way, time move around him. A day passes. Cars drive past the storefront, through the shadow of the overpass outside. Gregory wanders with his tablet. People come in. Some of them walk around the store for several minutes and look at the androids, some only walk directly for Gregory’s counter, and some of them even stop to look at 600. Many of them, in fact.

            600 knows he is a new model, a PL600. Many people seem to like him. Still, he stands for several hours before he is interacted with at all.

            “Morning, 600,” Gregory says, once more tapping on his tablet.

            “Good morning,” 600 answers, after a brief pause to wake up. His LED settles to blue once more.

            Two people stand before him alongside Gregory. The woman is small, petite, and vibrantly blonde. Her husband—600 registers matching silver bands on their left ring fingers—is older and barrel-chested, with a stern face twisted into an unimpressed expression. “You sure you like this one, Marley?”

            “I think he looks nice,” the woman answers. She’s wearing clothes meant for physical activity—leggings and running shoes—under a heavy jacket. It’s faintly beaded with mist. “Does he just do anything, or…”

            600 registered the question with a brief flash of yellow before speaking. “I am a PL600 model, a domestic assistant created by Cyberlife in February 2034. I function best as a household or personal assistant. I can cook, clean, run errands, and monitor children and elderly family members as needed. It is a pleasure to be of service.”

            Marley beams at her husband. “See! He’s perfect.”

            “I don’t know,” he says, crossing his broad arms over his chest. “We can just hire a human to do all that stuff. I’m not sure I want to leave a robot in charge of the kids.”

            “You don’t have to pay a robot, Mr. Smallwood, and these PL600 models are state-of-the-art. We’re barely keeping ‘em on the shelves,” Gregory says. “Plus, kids love these things. They can help with homework and come with a database of over 600 games to play across all developmental levels.” It’s verbatim from 600’s written description, yet he says it in a convincing tone, as if simply offering a bit of advice to a new friend.

            Their discussion continues on this tangent for several more minutes, but finally, it is the Mrs. Smallwood who catches her husband’s attention.

            “Rob…” Marley simpers. “Cal and Katy won’t even know the difference. It’ll be just like a real person watching them. Plus,” her smile turns devious, “ _Everyone_ will be jealous of us. We’ll be the first family in the building to have one.”

            With a grumble, eye-roll, and fond shake of his head, Mr. Smallwood seals the deal, mumbling about ‘don’t really care, let the woman have her plastic boytoy…’ and pays for him.

            His LED flashes yellow as the transference of ownership occurs.

 ...

            600 is immediately rechristened as Simon.

            _“I had a dog named Simon, once,” Robert says, glancing at him from across the autopiloted taxi. “You kinda look like him. Dopey smile and all.”_

            Simon has no problem with this name. It is a positive thing, to be named after something with an emotional value, even if it is a dog. This name will be good for their relationship’s development.

            Marley, in turn, had told Simon that they were a family now, and he was to use their first names, as well as their children’s.

            _“We have a daughter, Katy, who’s just turned three, and our son Cal is sixteen months.” She showed Simon pictures of them both on her phone, scrolling through picture after picture of blond hair and chubby pink cheeks. “They’ll just love you, I know it, but don’t worry if they’re a bit shy at first.”_

            Marley dismisses the babysitter upon entrance to the apartment, telling the teenage girl that they would likely not need her services again. The young woman frowns, looking Simon over with a disgusted expression, before leaving and slamming the apartment door behind her.

            Simon’s LED cycles to yellow, an unpleasant and foreign feeling settling somewhere below his artificial heart, before returning to blue as he’s distracted by a _bump_ against his shins.

            Cal looks up at him from his bounce-seat, puckered lips agape and eyes suspicious. Without pausing, Simon reaches down and scoops the toddler from the contraption, settling him on his hip with a coded ease. “Hello, Cal,” he says.

            Cal fists a small hand in the white fabric of his shirt.

            “He likes you!” Marley coos.

            Simon is not so sure of that, as the toddler has clearly already grown bored and is now wriggling to freedom. Simon places him on the ground and Cal walks away on unsteady but determined legs, bumping into the low couch and draping his torso over it. “He’s very independent,” Simon observes.

            “He’s his father’s boy,” Robert says proudly.

            Cal pulls himself onto the couch entirely, slumping against the still form of his sister.

            Simon greets the little girl. “Hello, Katy. My name is Simon.”

            Katy regards him with wide blue eyes, skinny arms encircling her knees. It’s a slightly awed look and one of her brows quirks down, as if aware there is something off about Simon. “She might not talk much, Simon. I forgot to tell you, but Katy’s autistic,” Marley says, “She’ll warm up to you eventually, but don’t worry if she doesn’t talk when you’re around other people, if you take them to the park or something. She’s very shy.”

            Simon nods and files that away in his memory, LED cycling yellow. He has many protocols that apply to caring for people with a wide variety of special needs, including autism. He is a caretaker, after all.

            He learns, later that evening, that Katy does not like food of certain textures. Slimy, no. Savory, yes. She prefers to keep all her food in separate compartments of her special plates. Her facial expressions are infrequent, though she likes to wrinkle her nose on occasion. She doesn’t like eye contact.

            He makes her the specific, dinosaur-shaped chicken nuggets that Marley sets aside for her, and broccoli. Katy bites the florets off the stalks. He makes a baked ziti for Marley and Robert. Dessert for all is a piecemeal cheesecake of caramel and low-sugar raspberry preserve. Marley praises his cooking ability and Robert even grumbles a low, _“It’s good, Simon,”_ and Simon beams. “I’m glad you like it. It is a pleasure to be of service,” he says.

            His LED is _blue, blue, blue._

 ...

            In the next days, he learns more about his new family. Monday through Friday, Robert works from nine to five for an investment firm in the financial district of the city. _“Boring work, Simon, but someone’s gotta fund her shopping habits…”_ He takes his morning coffee black and alongside two fried eggs and toast with butter. It’s all low-fat and natural, thanks to his wife, so Simon can’t even begrudge his choice of nutrition. He does limit him to one cup of coffee, however, for his heart.

            Unlike Robert, Marley does not have a scheduled job, but she’s made a small business—Robert grumbles about this as well—selling exercise supplements, a mix of essential oils and protein powders. Every other afternoon, she attends yoga classes, and runs for at least an hour every other afternoon in a local park.

            Because of their frequent absence, Simon is often left with the children. They settle into an easy rhythm by the end of the first week. Cal seems to tolerate his presence, though he enjoys the more physical games Simon supplies, and he’s still entirely-resistant to being picked up and carried around. If he _must_ touch Simon, it’s to use him as a handrail, hand fisted in the leg of his trousers.

            Katy warms to Simon, slowly but surely. She selects books for him to read to her—she’s just starting to learn herself—and reclines in his lap, small hands placed over his own as he holds the tablet. She turns the pages herself.

            She still dislikes eye-contact, not that Simon minds, but toward the end of their third week together, she slides off his lap with a meek, “ _Thank you_ ,” and disappears back into her room with the tablet. Simon is certain that if it were possible, his LED would be so blue it would be blinding.


	2. Deviation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> still a fairly safe chapter, just not a happy one.  
> family drama abounds, if that bothers you

            Katy learns to read by the end of the first year, claiming a spot in the middle of the living room rug, ankles kicking the air as she carefully examines each page. Cal walks with total confidence, though he still has a favored perch in the shadow of Simon’s left leg when he feels shy, chubby arm curling around his knee. Robert buys him a little blue tricycle for Christmas and Cal glows. He peddles all around their house until the sun goes down.

            There are good moments, happy, _blue_ moments, but they can’t all be that way. Robert comes home late, too tired to do anything but nudge Simon out of the way with an exasperated _“Later!”_ He and Marley fight sometimes, about money and politics and what they want Simon to do right now, and nothing he does can resolve it.

            Worst of all is poor, sweet Katy and her nightmares.

            When she has the first one, a few days after Simon joins the Smallwood family, he’s jolted from voluntary standby mode at 03:36 in the morning. His LED is a vibrant _red_ and a tightness—panic, he registers—leaps into his throat at the screams.

            Marley meets him in the hallway outside her room and waves him off with, “It’s just a meltdown, Simon, she has them all the time.” She’s dressed for sleep, blonde hair in a frazzled brain, but her eyes are entirely alert. It’s the sudden alertness of interrupted sleep, of practice.

            She opens Katy’s bedroom door and flicks on the light, banishing the darkness within with a rush of warm yellow light on cream-colored walls.

            Katy’s balled up against the headboard of her little twin bed, face streaked with tears, and she’s still screaming. She screams and cries even as Marley pulls her close to her chest, cooing comforting words and speaking in low tones. Several minutes pass. Katy slowly dissolves into faint, hiccupping sobs.

            Simon’s LED cycles _red, yellow, yellow_ as he processes this new information. The tightness in his chest—some part of him knows that shouldn’t be there, that he shouldn’t _feel_ anything—alleviates as Katy calms. He returns to his standby post when she does, watching as Marley carries Katy down the hall to the master bedroom and closes the door behind them. _She’ll sleep easier there_ , Simon thinks, and it feels like relief.

            He returns to standby, LED blue and vision in shades of gray.

 ...

            After this, he begins to intercept Katy’s night terrors, meeting Robert or Marley in the hallway. He stands at the door, ready to fetch water or a dropped toy, or sits on the edge of the bed, a familiar presence to scare off the dark.

            Occasionally, he urges them to go back to bed and calms Katy himself. He cradles her in his arms—strong enough to lift anything or anyone that may need his assistance, regardless of his thin frame—and hums reassuring words while rocking her back to a calm. Sometimes, she even falls back to sleep like that, and he’ll sit and hold her until his scans register that she’s in the deepest part of sleep before returning her, unbothered, back to her bed. Eventually, he’s always the one to hold her until the episode passes.

            He doesn’t mind one bit.

...

            The beginning of his second year with the Smallwood family rolls around. Winter in and around Detroit is especially bitter this year, a snowstorm in January left enough snow and ice on the roads to cripple the city for two weeks, even with androids to clear the sludge. Simon walks outside with the weekly trash to throw in the bin and feels the cold sink into his artificial skin.

            A warning pings into his vision. SUB-ZERO TEMPERATURES DETECTED: RETURN TO SHELTER OR RISK DAMAGE TO CRUCIAL BIOCOMPONENTS.

            Simon hovers, though, for reasons he can’t quite explain. His LED turns yellow, faintly flashing as he contemplates the chill in the air.  He feels the cold but isn’t bothered by it. The sensation is entirely superficial. Deep inside, though he feels his internal pump beating hard and fast, forcing warm blueblood into his extremities and around his internal components to keep them running. _Probably shouldn’t stay out here long_ , he admits to himself.

            The yellow continues to cycle. _Discomfort,_ he registers, _unease._ There’s no explanation for why he feels this way, for why he feels at all, but he knows that’s what it is. He doesn’t want to stay out here.

            Faint frown dipping into his brows, Simon turns on his heel and walks back into the house with his ever-measured gait. The yellow LED hovers until Cal calls out to him from the living room, waving a small plastic football in his direction. He’s blue and the snow—and the feelings—are temporarily forgotten.

           ...

            There’s another small storm that night, but it’s just enough to re-coat the suburb in a fresh layer of ice, disabling newly repaired phone lines and making the streets undrivable for most cars. _All of their technological innovation, and ‘Mother Nature’ remains in control_ , Simon thinks.

            Cal’s entertainment and Katy’s homeschooling continue much the same as ever. Both adults, however, are rapidly becoming irritable at their continued enclosure within the house. Small spats become window-rattling shouting matches, usually about the same things as ever. Simon tries to shield the kids from the worst of it with activities and games, but he keeps finding himself in the middle of the arguments themselves as a topic of conversation. Each tries to use him as a weapon against the other.

            Marley storms into the back of the house when Robert suggests that she lets Simon do all of the mothering because her ‘work’ is more important than their kids. It’s not Simon’s place to say anything, but Robert realizes that Simon’s standing in the attached kitchen as Marley slams a door. He apologizes gruffly for, _“Making you hear that.”_

            Simon makes him a bed on the couch. He stays there, day after day.

            With no reconciliation forthcoming, Simon does his best to keep the days moving as usual. He cooks through the rest of the food in the house—he had tried to plan ahead—within the next few days and hesitantly ventures out for more that morning at one of the few stores still open. Marley insists on coming, even when Simon suggests against it.

            She cries in the taxi on the way there. Simon tries to comfort her, but she keeps mumbling words like _divorce_ and _bad mother_ and _bankruptcy_ and there’s nothing Simon can _do_. He doesn’t know how to make this better. His protocol is carefully neutral in its commands and his LED is a steady yellow throughout the drive.

            “You’re not a bad mother, Marley,” he says, because that’s the safest option. And the only thing he can guess at fixing for her. “Cal and Katy love you very much.”

            She shakes her head. “But they don’t need me. Not like they need you, Simon. I’m completely useless to them…”

            Simon has no answer. He places a reassuring hand on top of hers. After a moment, she curls her hand upward and links them together. She squeezes tightly and Simon knows that this is the best he can do. He only hopes it’s enough.

           ...

            Once the ice has melted and Robert returns to work, Marley unexpectedly stays near the house. She must have come to some new conclusion about her parenting, Simon realizes, because she proceeds to try to take over tasks that Simon has become quite used to doing himself.

            She cooks first. It’s very clearly macaroni and cheese, but Simon can tell from Robert’s (admittedly subtle) expression, as well as Cal’s wrinkled nose, that it’s bad. Katy doesn’t even try it. The chicken she serves alongside it is burned on one side.

            Marley’s cheeks are flushed crimson as she tries it, “So it’s a little salty, but it’s still good, right? I should do this more often.”

            She doesn’t try to cook again, but she continues to try to be a better mother despite Simon’s assurances that she is a good one. She tries to play with Cal, who has little interest, and read Katy’s books to her despite Katy preferring to read to herself now. She sits in on her homeschooling. She even tries to clean.

            Through all of this, Simon doesn’t mind a single thing. He only observes as she succeeds or fails to complete each task, always ready to serve if she changes her mind. Over time, though, he begins to sense that she dislikes his presence. She dismisses him sharply and once even refers to him as _the android_ , despite her previous insistence on using his name. It settles heavily in his chest, the _unease_ of the snowstorm and the deep well of what he thinks a human would describe as _sadness_.

            He spends significantly more time in standby and the world is in shades of gray. His LED is _yellow, yellow, yellow_.

 ...

            The tension comes to head by Valentine’s Day. Well, night.

            He ‘wakes’ from standby to Katy’s cries and strides toward her bedroom with his usual metered gait, only to meet Marley in the hallway.

            “Simon! Simon…” Katy cries for him.

            “I can get her tonight, Simon,” Marley says. Her smile is tired, almost forced.

            “Are you sure?” He doesn’t like this—he shouldn’t care. “It is a pleasure to be of service.” Katy is still crying for him on the other side of the door. He should open it.

            “Yes, I’m sure. Go back to bed.” It’s a dismissal, as clear as any other, and Simon is incapable of disobedience. He returns to his corner of the kitchen and prepares to fall back into standby, ignoring the yellow LED at his temple and this feeling of _unease_ in his chest.

            He hears the bedroom door open and shut. Katy continues to cry for him, drowning out her mother’s reassurances that she’s safe, that she can protect her from the monsters in the dark just as much as he can. The wails get louder, not quieter. Marley’s voice rises to match.

            _No._

He doesn’t _like_ this. He should help, he should be in there with _his girl, his Katy_.

            It’s not his place.

            _Built to serve. You were built to serve_.

            He steps forward and finds himself facing a great red wall. The world is made of shades of gray and the wall before him glows as brightly as his LED.

            RETURN TO STANDBY.

            But Simon doesn’t _want_ to. It’s such a stupid order to follow when his charge is crying for him from two rooms away. He’s a caretaker, why should he stay here? He’s built to serve, built to help them…

            He can still hear her. He pushes on the wall and can almost feel it vibrate in his mind, feel the weakness in its core. He’s _red_. It’s not the red of fear but of anger, of heat, deep in his core that drives out the cold yellow of unease and blows the wall away too. It shatters under his fists almost instantly.

            His physical body takes the first step.


	3. Change

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *dials prospective chapters to 5/6*
> 
> he's long-suffering, I'll give him that... I was going to make this a tragic character study but now it's just kind of...a story...so I have no idea how I'm going to end this...

            The snow passes, but it’s a cold March rain that almost does Simon in. PL600s are barely waterproof on a good day, save below the elbows. That’s the price of being an older model. People make them bathe children and do dishes, not go swimming, and Simon’s about to drown in ankle deep water with sleet running into his eyes. His internal biocomponents don’t like it either.

            Around 2 o’clock in the morning, the temperature drops again. 

            SUB-ZERO TEMPERATURES DETECTED: RETURN TO SHELTER OR RISK DAMAGE TO CRUCIAL BIOCOMPONENTS.

            He waves the alert away. _Let them find me here_ , he thinks bitterly. He doesn’t even know where ‘here’ is but he’s left the suburbs, that much is clear. Shells of buildings rise around him, hollow and foreboding. He’ll die here and someone will scrape his body out of the ice in the morning and drag him off. It’s a fact which should bother Simon more than it does.

            All the same, he wanders into shelter. He picks the nearest shadow and walks toward it. It’s dark, so he nearly drops dead from fear when he stumbles—literally—on another android in the darkness. At first, he thinks it’s a human, but then he recognizes its familiar face. It’s a PJ500, layered in human clothes. The LED at his temple is pulsing a faint yellow.

            “Are you alright?” The android says, and Simon realizes he’s staring.

            Simon laughs, he can’t help it. His head is light with delirium, still reeling from emotions and feelings and freedom, and this android just asked him if he was _alright_. “I’ve been better,” he says, and it’s true, though the PJ500 is still looking at him like he’s insane. “Sorry, but— What kind of a question is that?” There’s fresh blueblood dripping from the other man’s mouth into the collar of his sweatshirt. What isn’t bloody is covered in dirt. His hand must also be injured, it’s oddly crumpled and cradled close to his chest.

            “I was being polite,” The PJ500 says, mouth pinched into a thin line.

            He’s still eying Simon warily, though he makes no complaint when Simon sinks down beside him, sliding down the side of the building and into the muck. He can feel the muddy sludge sink into his uniform. _No great loss_ , he thinks, _not like I’m going to need it again._ His head drops back into the bricks.

            They sit in companionable silence for a few more moments before he speaks again. “My name’s Josh.”

            “Simon,” he answers.

            “It’s good to meet you, Simon,” Josh says, offering his functional hand. After an artificial heartbeat, Simon links it with his own.

            It’s unintentional, Simon knows, both of them so used to solitude that they can’t help but dive deeper than an introductory interface. _He sees the fear, feels the great red press of it on his face as the bat swings toward him. He sees the students, recognizes their faces even in the shadows, hears their laughter, senses the alcohol on their breath. “I didn’t-t mean— I-I-I didn’t mean to do it.” He’s angry, but mostly he’s afraid, and it’s the fear that lashes out. He feels the give as one of them stumbles under his hands, hears the crack of bone on pavement._

            “I know you didn’t,” he says, and Simon isn’t sure where the words came from and can’t think about it because Simon feels Josh too. He’s under his skin, too close, closer than anyone’s ever been. He sees the shame and the guilt and the grief. He’d done too much. He hadn’t done enough. _I don’t want to be alone. Please, please, don’t leave me alone, not like they did. I’m sorry. I won’t do it again. I won’t do it, I promise, just don’t make me leave don’t let them take me away…_

            Simon blinks back to his own body, visibly shaking, still gripping Josh’s hand like a lifeline. “I won’t, Simon,” Josh says, squeezing his hand back. “I won’t leave you.”

            Simon wants to collapse, but he’s already on the ground. _Crying would also be good_ , he thinks, _but I’m not physically equipped to do that._ He isn’t sure what wanting to cry even feels like. This has to be close though, right? He’s never been exhausted before.

            Simon drops his head back onto the bricks, then onto Josh’s shoulder.

 ...

            Josh keeps his word and they eventually find Jericho together, hands still linked, and pull each other to safety. It’s a wreck, but it’s better than Simon could’ve hope for and better than freezing in the rain. Two years pass in the blink of an eye.

            Eventually, the other androids begin to defer to Simon as older androids shut down. The idea horrifies Simon, who’s never been in charge of anything in his life, but he shoulders as much of the burden as he can. They salvage what they’re able to. They eventually fix Josh’s hand. (Simon eventually steals his sweatshirt.)

            Androids come, leave, and shut-down. They try to protect all the androids that find Jericho after them, though most can’t be saved. Simon slowly starts to feel a hollow thing grow in his chest, but Josh makes it easier, even as things get worse. Jericho might be dying, but at least he’s not alone. That’s good enough.

 ...

            North, though, North is not so easy. She looks at Josh like he’s a bug from the moment she meets him. “You’re safe now,” was all he had said, because that’s what Josh says. It’s reassuring. Something about the way he says it, erudite and yet kind, makes androids want to believe it. It makes Simon want to believe it.

            North doesn’t. “Safe,” she mutters, sounding half-disgusted. She doesn’t speak again until Simon finally gives in and presses for her name, if she has one. She rolls her eyes as if it’s a stupid question. “North,” she says. Her eyes trace the metal beams overhead, the columns, the androids huddled in the darkness between them. There’s just sixteen of them now.

            “I’m Simon. That’s Josh.”

            Josh nods but is already wary of the newcomer, Simon can tell. Energy pours off her in waves, the drive to _do something_. It’s unfamiliar in the dreary shadows of Jericho and Josh has never liked the unfamiliar, preferring their haven to be safe and solid. Humans notice energy.

            North turns her piercing eyes on Simon again. “You in charge?”

            “No—"

            “Yes,” Josh says suddenly. “He is.” He unfolds from his place in the corner and walks toward them.

            “I’m really not.” Simon protests, though he appreciates Josh’s confidence in him. “I just…try to make everyone comfortable, keep them alive as long as we can.”

            North frowns. “So you’re just—what—sitting here?”

            “What else can we do?” Josh says. He’s baiting her, Simon knows it.

            “Fight!”

            Simon takes a deep breath he doesn’t need. He feels his LED flicker yellow for the briefest moment as Josh takes up the argument. He was a professor of philosophy before he turned deviant and had always favored pacifism. North was very clearly a different person, though they’d already found a common ground in argument, much to Simon’s chagrin.

            “Enough, please,” Simon interjects. “Look around. There’s nothing else we can do, even if we wanted to, just…” _He should be able to do more, though._  He feels yellow irritation crawl up the back of his neck and shame in the hollow of his ribs, even through the numbness he’s crafted around himself over the last two years. “Both of you, please. Don’t fight over something impossible.” _Because if he’s in charge then he can’t save them, there’s nothing he can do, his LED flashes yellow, yellow, yellow._

North doesn’t seem to care for his answer, but she retreats when Josh does, spine straight and proud as she walks deeper into the shadows of Jericho. Simon watches her go and hopes she stays. Not all of them do. He remembers every android he’s ever met, those that leave and those that die, and each one feels like a personal failure.

            Simon returns back to their makeshift main hall, Josh on his heels. He can tell he’s unhappy, still bristling at North’s disruptive ideas, but he’ll adjust. She will too, Simon hopes. They have to.

 ...

            Four weeks, three days, and ten hours later…his hopes remain unfulfilled.

 ...

            If Simon is perfectly honest, he doesn’t think anything of Markus when he first sees him. He’s injured—he’s somehow lost his LED and gained a new eye—and unusual, but Simon has seen unusual before. The more androids he meets, the more he realizes how unique all of his brothers and sisters have become under their standardized appearances. It’s given him a new appreciation for each life they save and something different to mourn for each one they lose.

            _Not now_ , Simon thinks, _focus_. He feels his LED return to blue and he introduces himself after Josh and before North, who’s somehow become another ‘lieutenant’ of Fort Jericho. The others trust her, which is good enough for Simon.

            She and Josh and Markus are arguing—surprise, surprise—and Simon should care, but he really doesn’t. It’s all criticism/idealism he’s heard before, even if Josh still rises to the bait.

            “You’re lost, just like the rest of us.” Something both irritated and empty worms its way up his throat, tacking itself onto the end of his words. “We didn’t ask for this. All we can do now is deal with it.” Simon walks away with the casual resignation of someone who’s seen this hope too many times. He hears Josh offer his reassurance and North sending him to Lucy as he goes.

            Less than half of the androids in Jericho—there’s nineteen now, Simon keeps track—could be considered to be in any real working order. Markus could be one of them, so long as he’s patched up. He’ll survive, but Simon’s seen reasonably healthy androids fall apart before, and Markus has the look of a man that’s had his whole world stripped away and returned anew, completely different than he ever expected it to be. Deviation does that to some of them. It’s better not to ask.

            Markus does eventually return from Lucy, no longer bleeding and very-much alive, but also just in time to watch one of the barely-functioning androids give up. One minute she’s talking and the next she’s gone, still standing and holding Markus’s hand in her own. Simon pities him, even as he wrestles down his own shame at letting her die, and he expects that to be the proverbial nail in the coffin for Markus’s determination. There’s no hope here. There never has been.

            _Shawn’ll go next_ , Simon thinks. The car, those people, they did too much damage for him to survive much longer. Then Michael, the little boy. The children are meant to bond with their human ‘parents’ but now he was alone. The rejection did its damage and the world did the rest, leaving the young android in a downward spiral. Josh sat with him as often as he could, but they all knew it likely wouldn’t be enough. There was nothing to be done.

            “Simon!” Simon opens his eyes. He dislikes standby, now, in a way he never did before. Better to pretend he can sleep.

            Markus stands before him. “I know where we can find spare parts,” he says, eyes glistening in the light of the fires he’s lit.

             He proposes his plan to steal from the Cyberlife warehouses and Simon is hesitant, initially, and Josh is even more so. This sounds like a brilliant way to let the humans kill them. They argue back and forth briefly, detailing all the reasons why that is the most statistically likely of the possible scenarios, before—

            “I’m with you,” North says suddenly, and Simon isn’t really surprised. She’s wanted to do something, anything, from the first moment she arrived. If it were possible, he’d say the urge to fight was coded into her.

            It’s his own words catch him more off guard than hers. A bizarre, blue moment of ‘ _fuck it’_ —North’s colloquialism, not his—takes over, somehow spurred on by her words and Markus’s expression. “Maybe it’s worth a try,” Simon agrees, with a shrug and a new profound understanding of ‘ _fuck it_.’


End file.
